Folk musician and composer Aslak Brimi looks for smiles, laughter, tears and melancholy when he writes. With the Aslak Brimi Quartet, he was nominated for a Spelleman Award this year for the group's debut album Vev. - Such media time is not something you can take for granted as a folk musician today.
/ 03/05/2019 / Kristian DugstadFolk musician and composer Aslak Brimi looks for smiles, laughter, tears and melancholy when he writes. With the Aslak Brimi Quartet, he was nominated for a Spelleman Award this year for the group's debut album Vev. - Such media time is not something you can take for granted as a folk musician today.
Photo above: Live Andrea Sulheim
Name: Aslak Brimi
Age: 35
Current with: Weaving – Aslak Brimi Quartet
TONO member since: 2008
Who is Aslak Brimi? And who is the Aslak Brimi Quartet?
Aslak Brimi is a fiddler, composer and chemistry teacher from Lom in Gudbrandsdalen. I combine being a chemistry teacher with being a freelance musician and father of young children. It is a busy and fantastic everyday life. In the Aslak Brimi Quartet I have Bjørn Kåre Odde, Espen Wensaas and Svein Tore Werstad with me. Last year we released the album Vev, and are now working on the next album. The idea is close interaction and arrangements inspired by both traditional fiddle playing and chamber music and jazz.
Tell us about your musical background?
I was raised in a fiddle club at home in Lom, and studied fiddle with my father, Rolv Brimi, and the great fiddler Bjørn Odde. I have also played with many musicians in different constellations who have helped shape me as a musician. I have my foundation in traditional music, but I like to step out, for example into folk music.
Do you think Norwegian folk music has found its place in today's society? Does it get the place it deserves?
This is a question we often ask ourselves. But what is certain is that the environment is confident and believes that what we are doing is good. The folk music environment in Norway is large and vital, and in some areas has a lot of recruitment. But in the media, there are small doses of our music. Occasionally, there is a little folk music or dance as a "folklore" feature, but I don't think the great breadth is presented. We are a little surprised that NRK and the other media houses don't use instrumental music in regular radio time. Our music is presented in Folk Music Hour, and little else. And even if it is vocal, the feeling is that if there is a fiddle or tendency towards folk music, the barrier to it being accepted into the spotlight is high. It is perhaps not "folk" enough today.
How do you balance your work as a composer and folk musician?
For me, this composing thing has developed over time. I have increasingly developed a creative urge with the instrument. And for me, composing is very much connected to being a folk musician and not least a performer. My melody lines are created on the fiddle. But I am very conscious of working with traditional material as well. That is the foundation! In principle, I think that it is a challenge for folk music and folk music performers that there is little to earn in terms of money from playing traditional music. You have to compose and play your own music on stage to be paid. I really hope that eventually there will be a system that makes using traditional material more profitable than it is today.
What inspires you when you compose? Do you incorporate other elements than those you find in folk music?
For me, the goal is to find the good melody. It doesn't really matter what category the music falls into, or what inspires it, the important thing is to find verses and themes that can make you smile or laugh, or cry or become melancholic. This is probably something I have from my background in traditional music. After all, it is the good melodies that have survived the centuries. So the ideal is to create melody themes that are so good that they can stand up long after I've left.
How did the quartet come about?
As I worked more and more as a composer, I felt like creating a project where I used my own music. I have been writing songs for many years, and I wanted to have a project where this could be the starting point. I was asked to be artist of the month at Riksscenen in Oslo in 2016, and then I got the opportunity. Then I asked three musicians I would like to work with, and it just went from there.
How do you work together?
The most rewarding thing is to meet to be creative as a team. We combine arranging using improvisation and coming up with written arrangements. All rehearsal and arranging is a process over time where the music and sound image find their path and form. For me as a composer, it is very exciting to see what path the music takes.
Tell us about Aslak Brimi Quartet's debut album Vev?
This is music we worked on for several years. It was kneaded and shaped over time, and gradually became the music we recorded. It took a while before we found our "sound". We recorded an EP the year before, but weren't satisfied. But when we went into the studio with Vev, all four of us were in the same mode, we had landed.
You were nominated for a Spellemann award for the album. What does that mean?
Being nominated for Spellemann will always be prestigious. It's an extra treat that more people get to know about us and our music. As a band, we got media time, and that's not something you can take for granted as a folk musician today. Maybe it will be beneficial towards working on launching a new album next year.
What are you working on now? What does 2019 bring for you?
We are in the creative process of new material now. We will go into the studio in the winter after Christmas, and have plans to release it in the fall of 2020. So apart from a few concerts, 2019 will be a production year towards a new album.
What is your career highlight so far?
I was honored to be named Folk Musician of the Year in 2016. I was presented with the award in front of a full main hall at the Opera. It was huge.
What is your greatest musical experience?
I have many great musical experiences, and many that will stay with me my whole life. But one example is when I experienced Odd Nordstoga and Øyonn Groven Myhren performing Nivilkinn in 2003 in Rauland when I was a student at the Folk Music Department there. A small and intimate acoustic concert. I didn't know anything about Nordstoga at the time, but the intensity and excitement they had in that performance was fantastic. And they had done something that I have done a lot since then, namely setting poems to music. In the Nivilkinn music they have achieved precisely what I think is so fantastic, finding the good melody lines. That experience still remains with me as a great inspiration.